THE LARGEST CLEANUP IN HISTORY

Upcoming milestonePreparations for the cleanup

OVER 5 TRILLION PIECES OF PLASTIC CURRENTLY LITTER THE OCEAN

Trash accumulates in 5 ocean garbage patches, the largest one being the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, located between Hawaii and California. If left to circulate, the plastic will impact our ecosystems, health and economies. Solving it requires a combination of closing the source, and cleaning up what has already accumulated in the ocean.

Technology

The Ocean Cleanup develops advanced technologies to rid the world’s oceans of plastic. A full-scale deployment of our systems is estimated to clean up 50 % of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in 5 years.

Ocean garbage patches are vast and dispersed

Ocean currents concentrate plastic in five areas in the world: the subtropical gyres, also known as the world’s "ocean garbage patches". Once in these patches, the plastic will not go away by itself. The challenge of cleaning up the gyres is the plastic pollution spreads across millions of square kilometers and travels in all directions. Covering this area using vessels and nets would take tens of thousands of years and cost billions of dollars to complete. How can we use these ocean currents to our advantage?

Using the ocean currents to our advantage

The Ocean Cleanup is developing a passive system, using the ocean currents as its driving force to catch and concentrate the plastic. By suspending a large sea anchor in a deep, slow moving water layer, we can slow down the system enough so that the plastic moves faster than the cleanup system. This will cause the plastic to accumulate against the cleanup system.

Due to the screen’s U-shape, the plastic is funneled towards the center of the system. The highly concentrated debris is buffered until it is extracted and shipped to land. For more specifics about our system, please visit the technology page.

To catch the plastic, act like the plastic

Waves, winds and currents make the plastic move in a certain manner. The same forces will act on our roaming systems, causing them to gravitate to the areas in the garbage patch with the highest concentration of plastic.

The more cleanup systems released, the more plastic will be collected. Computation models show a full-scale deployment will lead to a 50 % reduction of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in 5 years’ time.

Extract, ship, recycle

In parallel to developing technology to extract plastic from the ocean, we also investigate how we can reuse the material once it is back on shore. Initial work on ocean plastic recycling shows our material can be turned into high quality products. Imagine your next phone, chair, car bumper or sunglasses could be made from plastic retrieved from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. By selling our branded material for reuse, we aim to eventually make the cleanup self-sustainable.

Autonomous

Algorithms help specify the optimal deployment locations, after which the systems roam the gyres autonomously. Real-time telemetry will allow us to monitor the condition, performance and trajectory of each system.

Energy neutral

Our systems fully rely on the natural ocean currents and do not require an external energy source to catch and concentrate the plastic. All electronics used, such as lights and AIS, will be powered by solar energy.

Scalable

By gradually adding systems to the gyre, we mitigate the need for full financing upfront. This gradual scale-up also allows us to learn from the field and continuously improve the technology along the way.

THE IMPACT OF CLEANUP

Our models indicate that a full-scale system roll-out could clean up 50% of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in 5 years.

Research shows the majority of plastic by mass is currently in the larger debris. By removing the plastic while most of it is still large, we prevent it from breaking down into dangerous microplastics.

Combining the cleanup with source reduction on land paves the road towards a plastic free ocean by 2050.

Concentration of microplastics with and without cleanup in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

“In order to keep 7.5 billion of us alive and prosperous and healthy it takes work and it takes initiative. [...] That's what The Ocean Cleanup is all about and we absolutely need their work.”

Chris Hadfield, Astronaut - Commander of Expedition 35

“What is interesting to see […] is that you are using nature to solve the mess we are doing on this planet.”

André Borschberg, Co-founder of the Solar Impulse project

“The Ocean Cleanup could be the unicorn of tomorrow. ”

CNBC

“I put my hope in young people. People who think differently. For them, a threat is not a threat but it’s a challenge. People like Boyan Slat of The Ocean Cleanup. ”

André Kuipers, European space agency astronaut

“Boyan Slat is inspiring people, organizations and governments to find solutions to the escalating threat of plastic debris in our oceans, while also serving as a reminder to us all that more work needs to be done [...]”